The music of Douglas Lilburn (1915-2001) was celebrated recently at his former residence in Wellington, New Zealand with the launch of Volume 3 of the Complete Piano Music Series performed by Dan Poynton (MMT2067). This celebration also acknowledged the release of Piano Music 1 (PEL01) from Promethean Editions, the first volume of the complete piano music of Lilburn in print, which accompanies the recorded series.

Douglas Lilburn occupies a pre-eminent position in New Zealand music, with a legacy extending well beyond his compositional output. As a composer, teacher and mentor he presided in innumerable ways over the artistic growth of New Zealand from 1940s onwards. From the early works redolent of the influence of Sibelius and Vaughan Williams, to the electro-acoustic pieces of his later years, his works have been instrumental in establishing a genuinely vernacular voice in New Zealand classical music.

In 2005 Trust Records launched the first volume in this award-winning recording series showcasing all of Lilburn’s piano music. The first volume received ‘Best Classical Album’ in the 2005 Recording Industry of New Zealand Music Awards and in the same year, Gramophone acclaimed that ‘[These] performances and recordings are unobtrusively excellent.’

This recording features Dan Poynton performing one of Lilburn’s most renowned works for piano, Chaconne (1946), which explores the grandeur of New Zealand’s South Island landscape as the musical subject matter and the composer’s emotional response to the force of life he perceived in those surroundings. This third volume of the series also introduces many first recordings of this iconic New Zealand composer’s piano music, including: ‘Six Pieces’ (1964), Three Preludes (1943), Fred’s Birthday (1965), Rondino for a Birthday (c.1943), Sonata in F Minor (1939), ‘Poco Lento’ (1960), The Young Pine Tree (1945), Hommage a D.A.F. (c.1965), Theme from ‘Variations on a Theme by Douglas Lilburn’ (1948) & ‘Christmas 1942’.